Attachment 2 to Tsukuba Communiqué Recommendations – G7 expert workshop on future of the oceans and seas
Background
The ocean is the largest feature on Earth - covering over 70% of its surface and is its
largest connected ecosystem. It delivers vital services for life – governing regional weather
and climate around the globe and providing resources - both non-living and living - while
also generating hazards that threaten life and property. The ocean and seas are worth over
$2.5Trillion per annum in direct economic benefit (and ten times more when including less
tangible ecosystem services)1 and would be the world’s 7th largest economy in their own
right. However, 90% of their economic value depends on healthy marine ecosystems that
are increasingly under pressure from human activity.
The ocean is changing, with some 30-35% of critical marine habitats having been overused
or destroyed, ocean acidity having increased by 26%, and oxygen generally depleting in the
coastal ocean. Indeed, the health of the ocean is such a crucial economic development
issue that it has warranted an explicit UN sustainable development goal (SDG 14) to
“conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable
development”. Similarly, SDG 13 looking at Climate Action recognises the significant
impacts of climate change which can lead to sea-level rise, decrease of sea ice extent and
thickness, changes in ecosystem productivity and biodiversity, extreme weather events and
changing weather patterns which are all influenced by the oceans and seas.
The changing ocean environment is a critical global issue which threatens the sustainable
use of the ocean by future generations. Despite this, many parts of the ocean interior are
poorly observed and significant challenges remain in developing and delivering the
knowledge necessary to assess the ongoing changes and their impact on economies,
policies and sustainable use of the oceans and seas. Tackling this issue requires a
concerted international observational effort.
Satellite observations provide unparalleled broad scale views of the ocean, but only see the
surface and permit very limited mapping of the ocean interior and seafloor. Research
vessels remain essential to studying ocean processes and to benchmark data from
autonomous systems, but research vessel surveys are too infrequent and limited in
geographic coverage. Over the past 10 years, autonomous floats (such as ARGO) have
revolutionized our ability to measure physical properties of the ocean interior and rapid
technological developments in autonomous sampling platforms and sensors promise
increased access to the deep ocean to measure a broad range of physical, chemical and
biological properties. However, further innovation is necessary to provide a suite of sensors
fully capable of capturing key biological processes, and consideration should be given for
options to help facilitate ocean observations from the range of available observing platforms
and systems.
1
Hoegh‐Guldberg, O. et al. 2015. Reviving the Ocean Economy: the case for action – 2015. WWF International, Gland, Geneva, Switzerland, 60 pp Attachment 2 to Tsukuba Communiqué Together these platforms and systems constitute an expensive global research and
monitoring infrastructure that needs to be managed as a whole to maximize the data and
information return on this collective investment. The experience with satellite deployments
and Argo are examples of successful global coordination to help facilitate ocean
observations that can be learned from.
Given that 93% of the global ocean is >200 m deep and spans many different jurisdictional
boundaries and is governed by established international law, ocean observing is “big
science”. Proper, sustained, comprehensive and globally coordinated observation of the
ocean and seafloor is necessary so that we have the tools to provide the data and
understanding required to inform, with evidence, policy decisions about use of the ocean,
especially against the background of human-induced change and natural variability. A
comprehensive ocean observing programme would need to operate under a sound
international framework in order to i) coordinate the deployment of global ocean observing
assets to optimize their usage, ii) promote global data sharing and best enhance
international access to data and data interoperability, iii) produce regular authoritative
assessments of the state of the oceans and the ecosystems they contain. Developing such
a system will enable us to deal with the critical issues outlined below.
1) Making sense and improving projections of global and regional-scale long-term
change and variability. This includes understanding the ocean and seas’ role in climate
change and the resultant changes in weather patterns, sea-level rise, changes in waves
and current regimes, de-oxygenation, warming as well as processes like ocean acidification.
An ambitious step change in our knowledge on the mutual interactions between the above
changes and biodiversity and ecosystem functioning is also required for improved
predictions and scenario analyses of the oceans and seas state. This advancement in
knowledge is a prerequisite to improve the ability to predict the near-term to decadal scale
to help respond to, adapt and mitigate these changes.
2) Sustaining the productive capacity and resilience of the sea’s and ocean’s
ecosystems as they come under increasing pressure from human activities. The
ability to assess the impact of wider environmental changes and stressors such as on the
prevailing conditions of our seas is needed, such as through pollution, eutrophication,
environmental change, acidification, habitat loss and over-exploitation of resources. Likely
population increases (possibly up to 9.7 billion by 2050) 2 , may lead us to consider the
oceans and seas as unlimited sources of high quality protein via near shore coastal
aquaculture and open ocean fishing. We require a timely and sustained flow of information
on ocean ecosystem state in order to manage the human exploitation of living resources in
a sustainable manner.
3) To minimise human impacts on the ocean and seas by sustainably harvesting
renewable marine resources and responsibly exploiting finite marine resources.
2
World Population Prospects: the 2015 Revision, United Nations, http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Publications/Files/Key_Findings_WPP_2015.pdf Attachment 2 to Tsukuba Communiqué Activities such as hydrocarbon and metal resources exploration/exploitation, large-scale
deep-sea fishing, are likely to occur in increasingly hostile and remote environments such
as deeper waters, at the seafloor and in high latitude environments. These expansions will
increasingly challenge our understanding of these activities and their impact on marine
biota and will in addition demand novel engineering approaches, thus posing significant
environmental and engineering challenges.
To identify potential solutions to these challenges a workshop of technical and policy
experts from G7 countries was held 8-9 March at the UK’s National Oceanography Centre
in Southampton. Following two days of productive discussions the following
recommendations are proposed to the G7 Science Ministers for action with the aim of
significantly enhancing ocean observation. The working group recognised that there were
many other areas that would benefit from concerted action and welcomed parallel work
being undertaken on resource efficiency and marine litter by Environment Ministers.
However, as the focus of the meeting was on ocean observation, the recommendations
below only relate to this aspect.
Recommendations
Recognising that sustained sea and ocean observations will be essential to improve
scientific knowledge about ocean climate, marine ecosystems, their vulnerability to human
impacts and the ways in which ocean processes affect human wellbeing, the expert group
recommends that the G7 Science Ministers take action to build on existing systems such as
GOOS to:
1. Support the development of a global initiative for an enhanced, global, sustained sea
and ocean observing system, developing new technologies and integrating new
physical, biogeochemical and biological observations while sustaining critical
ongoing observations and ensuring full co-ordination with existing mechanisms. This
should include but not be limited to:

Increasing the capability of the global Argo network to include more biological
and biogeochemical observation and observation of the deep sea;

Utilising and enhancing global glider/autonomous surface vehicle capability to
connect open ocean observing and the coastal shelf;

Developing the technologies needed for implementing fixed mooring and
deep sea observations;

Developing new and innovative sensor technologies to improve the efficiency
and effectiveness of sea and ocean observation, (especially biogeochemical
and biological sensors), which can be deployed on a variety of platforms
including deep sea observatories, drifting and autonomous vehicles
mentioned above and seafloor observatories;
Attachment 2 to Tsukuba Communiqué 
Supporting and accelerating the development and implementation of
ecosystem/ biodiversity Essential Ocean Variables (EOVs) for routine
implementation;

Improving sea-level observing networks and infrastructure to improve
provision of global and regional sea-level information, especially in areas
where sea-level changes are an increasing threat;

Continuing critical regional observing in the tropics and maintaining and
enhancing our observing capacity in the marine cryosphere (Arctic and
Antarctic);

Enhancing the effective use and international coordination of research ships
and satellites to leverage their unique capabilities in the ocean observing
strategy;

Fostering increased collaboration with the shipping industry on ocean
observations to explore increasing use of commercial fleets for observing of
the ocean and seas.
2. Support an enhanced system of ocean assessment through the UN Regular Process
for Global Reporting and Assessment of the State of the Marine Environment that
would help develop a consensus view on the state of the oceans on a regular
timescale. This would in turn enable sustainable management strategies to be
developed and implemented across the G7 group and beyond.
The enhanced assessment should:

ensure sustainable science-based ocean management and provide clarity on
resource-management;

promote observing and data sharing and development of products and
models that provide integrated ocean state knowledge;

promote co-ordination with relevant activities of the Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change/ Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and
Ecosystem Services;

underpin and capture progress towards SDG-14 goal;

raise the profile of ocean observing in general ; and

reduce the time lag between collecting observations and their application to
services for societal benefit through an interdisciplinary approach.
In an era of rapid planetary change, up-to-date information on ocean health is vital in
order to help minimise the costs and enhance the effectiveness of any remedial
action the international community might need to take to help conserve marine
resources.
Attachment 2 to Tsukuba Communiqué 3. Promote the improvement of global data sharing infrastructure such as GEO/GEOSS,
among others, to address the challenges not only of physical / chemical data but
also biological data. This should ensure the discoverability, accessibility, and
interoperability of a wide range (research, citizen, and commercial) of ocean and
marine data.
4. Strengthen collaborative approaches to encourage the development of regional
observing capabilities and knowledge networks. Through enhancement of global
coordination mechanisms and infrastructure, help build capacity to better use global
ocean information as well as to monitor the oceans, in particular in developing
countries.
5. Promote increased G7 political cooperation to both strengthen existing and enhance
future routine ocean observations by identifying the additional actions needed that
would enable effective and timely implementation of Recommendations 1 through 4. In support of the actions outlined above and to ensure rapid follow-up, it is recommended
that the working group continue and be overseen by a G7 officials group to monitor
progress and identify G7 country leads to take forward specific activities. This official level
group should report progress to the Senior Officials by the end of 2016 and ahead of the
next meeting of Science Ministers in Italy in 2017.